Henderson County Fire Departments

Henderson County has 12 County Fire Departments.  Some departments are staffed by all career members, most are staffed with a combination career and volunteer members and one department has solely volunteer membership.  In total, there are 685 firefighters in Henderson County.

Each Department goes through a rigorous process of being rated.  The NC Office of State Fire Marshal conducts inspections with fire departments to gather information needed to determine fire insurance classification, which will be used in the calculations of property insurance premiums. 

Henderson County's ISO Ratings are based on a 6-mile split district.  ISO Ratings are evaluated by water shuttles from hydrants and/or certified water points in the district.    One figure comes from response within 5 mile radius of the District, and the other (split) applies to responses to properties outside of the 5 mile radius.

Here’s an example of how Fire Department rating are calculated for a rating of 6/9E:

• If a structure is from 0 road miles from a fire station to 5 miles from a fire station within the assigned fire district, they will receive the first split rating indicated. (6 as above)

• If the structure is between 5 and 6 miles from a fire station within the assigned fire district, then they will receive the 2nd split rating (9E as above)

• Structures that exceed 6 road miles from a fire station within the assigned fire district will receive an ISO Rating of 10